Supreme Court Rules Against Wild Rule Used To Prosecute J6 Folks

If you’ve noticed, the majority of those who wandered peacefully through the halls of Congress were not charged with insurrection. They were charged with violating record keeping. Then typically held in jail without bond till their trial, sometimes in solitary

Supreme Court limits scope of obstruction law used in Jan. 6 prosecutions

The Supreme Court has narrowed the scope of a federal law used to charge hundreds of people with obstructing Congress during the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, jeopardizing many of those criminal cases.

The 6-3 ruling on Friday — in which two justices crossed the court’s usual ideological lines — may force federal prosecutors to reconsider charges in dozens of pending cases, and it could require judges to resentence some defendants already sent to prison for interfering with Congress’ effort to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the last presidential contest. About 350 of the 1,400-plus charged Jan. 6 defendants have faced obstruction charges now thrown into doubt by the court.

The majority concluded that the felony obstruction provision passed in 2002 in the wake of the Enron scandal applies only in cases where prosecutors can show a defendant attempted to tamper or interfere with documents or other records related to a government proceeding. The court rejected the government’s view that the disputed provision covers other activities that could obstruct an official proceeding — a ruling that hinged on an extensive analysis of the word “otherwise” built into the statute.

“Reading [the provision] to cover all forms of obstructive conduct would override Congress’s careful delineation of which penalties were appropriate for which offenses,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court’s majority.

What they’re talking about is Sarbanes-Oxley, which is about record keeping. Things like having to keep documents, that you need to keep all business emails, etc. When you delete an email from your work email it may disappear from your inbox but it is kept in a backend server. This is what the government used to go after many who really did next to nothing, because our Department of Justice is a political arm of the Democrats and uses creative methods to go after Republicans. Charging people with crimes should be easy: prosecutors shouldn’t have to go looking for creative charges to jail people. That’s a complete perversion of the legal system.

The ruling may have a limited impact on the obstruction charges former President Donald Trump faces for his effort to thwart the certification of the 2020 election results. Special counsel Jack Smith has argued that even under the narrowest interpretation of the statute, Trump is still culpable for obstruction because he sought to introduce fabricated documents — false electoral vote certificates — as part of his sweeping bid to stay in power.

If the government can get all sorts of creative, finding obscure ways to charge a former president instead of having something straightforward, they can easily do this to you, which should scare every citizen of this nation. Even the Democrat peasants should be concerned, because you never know if these authoritarian government workers will come after you in such a creative manner.

That argument, however, may not be available in many other Jan. 6-related cases. If prosecutors cannot show that rioters intended to impede the tallying of physical electoral vote certificates, the Justice Department likely will have to drop obstruction charges.

These people are threatened with 20 years in jail for wandering around the Capitol Building. Compare this to those involved in attacking federal workers and firebombing the federal building in Portland in 2020. For instance, Edward Carubis, who assaulted a federal officer, ended up pleading guilty to one misdemeanor charge of assaulting a federal officer, and was hit with “time served.” That’s it. Which is the same for most. None have been specifically charged with things like firebombing the building, or attempted murder, since there were people in the building when they tried to set it on fire. This is a total mismatch in treatment to the J6 people, despite the violence and property destruction.

Roberts warned that the Justice Department’s “novel interpretation would criminalize a broad swath of prosaic conduct, exposing activists and lobbyists alike to decades in prison.”

Those who assaulted federal officers get misdemeanors. Those who walked around Congress get major felonies for record keeping. Think one what government could do. That’s what Roberts is saying.

Read: Supreme Court Rules Against Wild Rule Used To Prosecute J6 Folks »

Bummer: Trump Won’t Commit To Doing Anything About Hotcoldwetdry

Well, Trump has already said he would love to build lots of nuclear power plants

Trump Won’t Commit to Doing Anything About Climate Change

Former President Donald Trump on Thursday refused to commit to taking any action to address the climate crisis.

Asked during the first 2024 presidential debate if he would take any action as president to slow the climate crisis, Trump first spoke about how police groups are supporting his campaign. Next, he falsely claimed that President Joe Biden had called African Americans “superpredators,” adding that Biden has “also done a horrible job for Hispanics.”

CNN gave Trump another opportunity to name any action he would take as president to slow the climate crisis.

“So I want absolutely immaculate clean water, and I want absolutely clean air,” Trump responded. “And we had it. We had H2O, we had the best numbers ever. And we did. We were using all forms of energy, all forms — everything. And yet, during my four years, I had the best environmental numbers ever — and my top environmental people gave me that statistic just before I walked on the stage. Actually, that is true.”

You know, I remember a time when Rolling Stone was counter-culture, when they said not to trust anyone over 30, when they refused to believe the government line without rock-solid proof, and, even then, they’d be skeptical. They lost their roots to the hippy times.

But, yeah, Trump mostly talks about fossil fuels (I still do not buy into clean coal), releasing American energy. He’s never had a problem with solar and wind, but, he doesn’t want them to replace fossil fuels until they can actually compete, and without desecrate vast tracks of wilderness and waterways. He doesn’t buy into the climate cult. He will try and end the Green New Deal. He’ll reverse the mandates which force citizens into EVs (and, by citizens, I mean the middle and working class. Few elites actually travel in one). My one bit that I did not like is that he took way too long to get the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Accord. Should have been done in the first week, not his last few months.

Read: Bummer: Trump Won’t Commit To Doing Anything About Hotcoldwetdry »

Illegal Alien Who Raped 15 Year Old Released On $500 Bond In SCB

Now, imagine that the rapist was an American citizen: do you think they would have been freed on $500 bond?

Haitian migrant accused of raping teen girl in Boston freed on $500 bail

A Haitian migrant accused of raping a 15-year-old at a Massachusetts shelter has been released on bail — despite a request from federal immigration officials to keep him in jail.

Cory Alvarez, who had been held without bail since his March arrest, was freed on a measly $500 bail on Tuesday after the Plymouth County Superior Court ignored a request from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to keep the suspect in custody, the Boston Herald reported.

Alvarez was released following a dangerousness hearing, a spokesperson with the Plymouth County District Attorney’s Office told The Post Friday.

“We then requested that Alvarez be held on $10,000 cash bail with numerous conditions of release. The judge set bail at $500,” they explained.

Alvarez, 26, was released with an ankle monitor, but ICE officials can’t track him because Boston is a sanctuary city — meaning local authorities don’t have to cooperate with the feds.

ICE filed a detainer, but, like most sanctuary jurisdictions they refused to cooperate. Illegal alien sanctuaries usually demand warrants, even for scumbags like a guy who rapes a 15 year old.

Former ICE field office director John Fabbricatore said Alvarez’s release is emblematic of “a concerning trend of inadequate and failed vetting procedures.”

“This rushed process undermines the thorough checks typically conducted before granting parole or visas. The current administration’s haphazard approach raises significant safety concerns for US citizens,” Fabbricatore told The Post.

“In particular, this recent case involving an accusation of rape by a Haitian national admitted under the Biden parole program highlights the ongoing issue. Additionally, sanctuary city policies continue to provide protection to foreign-born criminals rather than safeguarding law-abiding, tax-paying citizens.”

Sanctuary cities will let illegals go quickly because they do not want ICE to get their hands on them. But, then

(Fox News) Migrants sleeping on the floors of Boston’s Logan International Airport will soon be banned from doing so and Massachusetts officials are telling migrants currently at the southern border that its shelter system is out of space.

Most will soon be booted and moved to other facilities.

Imagine what we could do for the homeless Americans if we weren’t spending it all on illegals, including rapists.

Read: Illegal Alien Who Raped 15 Year Old Released On $500 Bond In SCB »

If All You See…

…is a fast rising sea because Other People won’t go vegetarian, you might just be a Warmist

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The blog of the day is Jo Nova, with a post on the NY Times noticing that the Maldives are not sinking.

Read: If All You See… »

Scotland Yard Raided Homes Of Just Stop Oil Wackos, Arrests Them

I’m not quite sure how I feel about this, though. I’m laughing, but, also, they hadn’t actually committed a crime yet. But, they were threatening to break the law in a criminal conspiracy, right? What do you think

Just Stop Oil: Police swoop on 27 activists suspected of summer airport chaos plot in wave of raids

Police have carried out a nationwide wave of arrests against Just Stop Oil supporters suspected of plotting to disrupt airports this summer.

The arrests took place in London, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Devon, Essex, Manchester, Surrey, Sussex, Norfolk and West Yorkshire, the Metropolitan said in a statement on Friday.

Scotland Yard said that on Tuesday four people were arrested after being identified at Gatwick Airport and have been released on bail.

It said that on Thursday six more people were arrested at an east London community centre “as part of a publicly-advertised event promoting airport disruption”.

“Among those held were several high-profile members of Just Stop Oil who we believe to be key organisers,” the force said.

And on Friday, Met officers worked with eight other police forces to arrest 17 suspects at their homes across the country.

Regardless, this is based under UK law, not U.S. law, and they were all in cahoots to commit crime, disrupting federal airports. This is my favorite part

Notice all the objects that are made with petroleum around her home. And her clothes. And her giant glasses.

(Metro UK) Suspects released on bail are subject to conditions which include not travelling within one kilometre of any UK airport unless passing by while on a mode of transport.

I’m sure they’ll violate the bail conditions.

Read: Scotland Yard Raided Homes Of Just Stop Oil Wackos, Arrests Them »

Most Agree That Biden Had A Very, Very, Bad Night At The Debates

Remember, Biden took a week off to prepare. This is a guy who first took office as a Senator in 1973, then served 8 years as Obama’s VP, and has been president since 2021. You’d think he would have had this stuff down

Debate-watchers in the Biden and Trump camps seem to agree on something. Biden had a bad night

“Oh, Joe.”

That gasp, from patrons at a Chicago bar when President Joe Biden first stumbled verbally in his debate with Donald Trump, spoke for a lot of Americans on Thursday night.

In watch parties, bars, a bowling alley and other venues where people across the country gathered to tune in, Trump supporters, happily, and Biden supporters, in their angst if not dread, seemed to largely agree they had witnessed a lopsided showdown.

By the end of the 90-plus minutes, some Democrats were saying what partisans say to put the best face on things: It’s still early. One debate doesn’t necessarily sway the nation. Judge him by what he’s done and wants to do, not by how he says things.

But many were let down.

Biden “just didn’t have the spark that we needed tonight,” Rosemarie DeAngelus, a Democrat from South Portland, Maine, said from her watch party at Broadway Bowl. Trump, she said, showed “more spunk or more vigor” even if, in her view, he was telling a pack of lies.

Trump was his normal Trump self while Biden mostly looked lost. In honesty, I only watched about 3 minutes, and for most of that time he appeared as if he had no idea where he was, with a few maniacal smiles here and there. It’s never good in a debate to have negative looks. Remember Gore stalking around the debate area, making all sorts of noises? At one point Bush looked up like “why are you near me?” It was a bad look. This was disastrous.

Of course, Joe’s handlers tried to say that he had a cold. Nixon had the flu. Those who watched on TV said he lost to Kennedy. Those who listened on radio said Nixon one. Joe’s answers were so bad that no one listening would make any mistake that Biden lost and sounded lost.

Among them, Vance Gonzales, 40, a moderate Democrat, said the debate convinced him that “we need another Democratic candidate, to be honest, because this is not competitive.” He said of Biden: “He’s not on point with anything. I think it’s disappointing.”

As you peruse the news outlets you see a lot of that. Biden’s lost, and need to be replaced. At one point we got this

(AL.com) In one of the debate’s early moments, Biden stumbled toward the end of a response on why voters should trust him to solve the country’s immigration crisis:

“I’ve changed [immigration law] in a way that now you’re in a situation where they’re 40% fewer people coming across the border illegally, especially when [Trump] left office. And I’m going to continue to move until we get the total ban on the total initiative relative to what we can do more border patrol and more asylum officers,” Biden said.

In response, Trump said: “I don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either.”

And Joe’s look while Trump was responding is the way he looked most of the night: wondering where he is.

But, how many minds will it change? Trump should be out there saying “OK, you don’t personally like me. That’s OK. But, do you think I will do a better job? That’s the crux of the matter, folks, who will do better.”

Read: Most Agree That Biden Had A Very, Very, Bad Night At The Debates »

Study Shows “Carbon Footprints” Of Websites

So, when will all the Warmists who use the Internet stop? Will they give up Youtube, Instagram, TikTok, and others? To save the planet?

Study shows the carbon footprint of popular websites

The average American spends more than 7 hours each day online, according to data from GWI. By 80 years old, that would be equivalent to 18 years of adult life looking at a screen.

As web functions become more advanced and users are spending more time scrolling, websites are becoming a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions.

“If the internet was a country, it would be the fourth largest emitter of carbon dioxide in the world,” said Charles Howes, CEO of Klatch, a digital marketing company.

Climate Cultists sure don’t seem to like the modern world, eh? Funny that they’re also publishing this on the Internet. Did they plant trees to offset?

Klatch analyzed more than 500 of the biggest global websites and determined carbon emissions per user.

The study found some of the top 50 websites use fossil fuels to power their servers and data centers including Bing, Yahoo, and Reddit.

“A lot of the big sites – Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, WhatsApp – if they could switch to sustainable energy and make sure that they’re looking at their carbon emissions per user, they’re going to have a huge impact on the web and its energy efficiency,” Howes said. (snip)

X, formerly Twitter, would need to plant five trees to offset the carbon generated by 10,000 pageviews, a number reached on the site every 3 seconds.

TikTok would need to plant 15 trees for the same number of views.

Whelp, kiddies, time to stop making all your stupid videos along with watching them.

Obviously, the activism shows, because, why else would they waste time and money doing this?

As we continue to rely on digital platforms for work, entertainment, and communication, it’s crucial that consumers and businesses alike, also advocate and support sustainable practices. By making conscious choices and supporting companies that prioritise the environment, we can collectively make a significant impact.

What if we do not want to do this? What if we don’t care, we just want our Internet stuff?

Oh, and stop using a black background with white letters. Damn, but I hate that. Just messes with your eyes.

Read: Study Shows “Carbon Footprints” Of Websites »

SCOTUS Rules In Favor Of 7th Amendment, Fans Of Administrative State Unhappy

Well, they’re unhappy now, but, the minute the Government comes after them in an un-Constitutional manner they’ll be happy for the ruling. But, will Biden and the Executive Branch follow the ruling?

‘Tough luck’: The Supreme Court just took a new bite out of Biden’s agencies’ powers

Bill Of RightsThe Supreme Court’s newest rebuke of the Securities and Exchange Commission is threatening to unleash chaos throughout the federal government, creating uncertainty about the limits on agencies’ power to punish law-breakers.

The 6-3 ruling held that the Constitution’s 7th Amendment guarantee to a trial by jury applies when the SEC seeks civil penalties for securities fraud. But legal experts said it raises questions about a wide range of agencies’ ability to impose fines for violations of a host of laws and rules, including those protecting consumers, workers and the environment.

Agencies that suddenly face new potential challenges to their decades-old enforcement powers include the Environmental Protection Agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Labor Department and the National Labor Relations Board, lawyers and former agency officials told POLITICO.

The decision “could threaten EPA’s enforcement program as we know it,” said Kevin Minoli, a former acting general counsel at the agency. He said it raises questions about whether “everyone facing a government penalty has the right to request a jury trial” — and how many defendants will choose to invoke that right.

Most EPA enforcement actions are handled through an administrative process, not litigation, Minoli noted in an email. The agency does not have the resources to take every environmental violation to court, and neither does the Justice Department, said Minoli, now an attorney at Alston & Bird.

Let’s take a look at that 7th Amendment

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

If the government is coming after you for more than $20 they should have to prove their case in front of a jury, should they not? And, let’s be clear, it’s the Executive Branch which is doing this, all while working as prosecutor and judge. Leftist say that all sorts of criminals (who often do not even know they broke some arcane law or rule, with many of those rules not even being the intention of the duly passed laws) will now get away with it because the government doesn’t have the resources to prosecute. Well, yeah, that’s too bad, but, the government must be responsive to The People. It is not our ruler. Perhaps now the government will go after the big cases, rather than going after the little people who do not have the resources to fight the government, which made them easy targets.

https://twitter.com/StevenJDuffield/status/1806339082122822032

The ruling should have been 9-0, but, the liberals are unfamiliar with the tenants of the Constitution and that government is limited, and forbidden to act as potentates. That government is not allowed to run roughshod on the citizens it is meant to serve. And lots of liberals are very upset. Right up to the point where it is them the government is going after.

Read: SCOTUS Rules In Favor Of 7th Amendment, Fans Of Administrative State Unhappy »

Low Cost Chinese EVs Could Cause Problem For Automakers In US Or Something

But, will people actually want to buy them?

Prospect of low-priced Chinese EVs reaching US from Mexico poses threat to automakers

Electric vehicleIt’s a scenario that terrifies America’s auto industry.

Chinese carmakers set up shop in Mexico to exploit North American trade rules. Once in place, they send ultra-low-priced electric vehicles streaming into the United States.

As the Chinese EVs go on sale across the country, America’s homegrown EVs — costing an average of $55,000, roughly double the price of their Chinese counterparts — struggle to compete. Factories close. Workers lose jobs across America’s industrial heartland.

Ultimately, it would all become a painful replay of how government-subsidized Chinese competition devastated American industries from steel to solar equipment over the past quarter-century. This time, it would be electric vehicles, which America’s automakers envision as the core of their business in the coming decades.

Low-priced Chinese EVs pose a potentially “extinction-level event’’ for America’s auto industry, the Alliance for American Manufacturing has warned.

Would Americans want tiny EVs? Perhaps for city only drivers. You wouldn’t really be able to go far in them, and, what of repairs? What of insurance costs? Would they want to spend $27500 for one, when they can get a Civic or Corolla? In reality, a lot of the Chinese EVs for Europe are a lot less expensive, because they are being subsidized by the Chinese government. And virtual slave labor to build them.

Of course, the people trying to force Americans into EVs, despite those Elites not driving them themselves, are happy with this

The threat from Beijing is emerging just as U.S. automakers face slowing EV sales. High prices and a shortage of charging stations are keeping many American consumers away.

Cheap Chinese EVs might help by pushing down prices, accelerating sales and encouraging investment in charging stations. “It would be cheaper just to let the Chinese cars come in, forget all the tariffs and subsidies, let the market figure it out,’’ said Christine McDaniel, a senior research fellow at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center. “Yes, it would be disruptive. But EVs would get on the road in the U.S. a lot faster.”

They want to restrict the working and middle classes from having easy fossil fueled travel by any means, even if it means letting China dominate the market. Though, would they? Further, will they have the safety standards required for the U.S.? People talk about America letting the market decide, but, the market would be skewed by China dumping the vehicles.

Read: Low Cost Chinese EVs Could Cause Problem For Automakers In US Or Something »

If All You See…

…is an area turning to desert from carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Not A Lot Of People Know That, with a post on British folks being tricked into being vegetarian.

Read: If All You See… »

Pirate's Cove